The interrelationships between these missionaries and Mexican American parishes transcended their pastoral

1Dolores Rivas Bahti, Ph.D. Aztlan in Arizona: Civic Narrative and Ritual Pageantry in Mexican America “My dearest Father in Christ: Today, I take pen in hand to relate some ”1impressions of America. With these lines P. Alejo de la Virgen del Carmen Coll began a November 1912 letter about a journey from Iberia to his new post in Arizona. The missive to Provincial Vicar Lucas de San Jose Tristany in Tarragona chronicled a turbulent trans-Atlantic passage to New York and overland rails stretching south- and westward from Atlanta, New Orleans and the Mississippi River Delta toward San Antonio. “Thus far, I encountered an America true to images conjured by poets and travelers,’ he wrote, “then everything changed.” P. Alejo recoiled from the limitless landscapes of New Mexico and Arizona. His dismay increased upon arriving in Sonora town, the Arizona mining settlement where P. Pedro de San Elias Heriz planned to establish a Carmelite parish. “I cannot share his optimism, since I could never have imagined a place like this. I sometimes think that Your Reverences have established our mission in the worse part of America.” Determined to do as God and his Order commanded, he added, “I know that these lines cannot please Your Reverence, but I will neither lie to you nor embellish my view of this reality. I will now undertake to learn English, for I cannot be effective in these parts without it. Yesterday I spoke with the Superintendent of Hayden. He ...